


(My Heart is Like) An Open Highway

by HobbitSpaceCase



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Angst, M/M, Mutual Pining, Somewhat established relationship, Steve and Billy are bad at communication, but things turn out alright in the end
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-24
Updated: 2017-11-24
Packaged: 2019-02-06 04:40:21
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,007
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12809829
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HobbitSpaceCase/pseuds/HobbitSpaceCase
Summary: Billy loves California.  Steve loves Billy.  It's not quite the disaster that it sounds like.





	(My Heart is Like) An Open Highway

“Cali’s more beautiful than anywhere else.”

Steve looks over, head lolling sideways on the hood of Billy’s car to look at him. Billy’s eyes are fixed overhead, but Steve thinks he’s not really seeing the stars, bright and clear over the outskirts of this tiny town they’re both stuck in.

“It’s always warm and alive, you know? Even when you’re alone, you can still feel the pulse of a million strangers all around you. So many people no one cares what happens to any one person. Makes you feel free. Like you could be anyone, do anything, and there’s a place for it.”

Steve hums in agreement. It does sound nice.

They’ve been doing this _whatever this is_ between them for a month, and this is the first time Billy’s talked after. The first time he turned to Steve after the orgasm glow faded from his eyes and asked if Steve wanted a beer, instead of immediately gunning the engine, flying from the scene of their deviance, and dropping Steve back at his own car without a word. Usually, Billy’s all charm and smiles till he gets what he wants, and then he’s quiet, the only time Steve ever sees him really quiet, with something vulnerable in his eyes like he’s been laid bare, insides too raw for words.

They don’t say anything else that night. The stars twinkle in the cold sky, a gentle breeze ghosting over their sweat-slicked skin, and they are quiet, the sound of beer sloshing against aluminum cans the only noise besides chirping bugs and wind in empty branches. But it’s a nice sort of silence. A little less angry, a little more calm than usual with Billy Hargrove.

o0o

 _Whatever this is_ had started with Dustin, bursting with eagerness to share some juicy gossip when Steve picked him up from school near the end of January, passing on the news that Lucas had said that Max had mentioned that Billy bought her a new skateboard.

“Course,” the kid had added, “he’s still a jerk and we still hate him. We haven’t forgiven him for hurting Lucas, or for what he did to your face. But he did tell Max he was sorry for hurting her friends. He’s scared of her.” An adoring look passed over Dustin’s face. “She’s awesome.”

The next day after school, Steve had confronted Billy. Told himself he just wanted to make sure it wasn’t some cruel prank or something, tried to ignore the twisting feeling in his guts that felt like Nancy taking him back after he apologized to Jonathon, dropped Tommy and Carol for being assholes. The twisting feeling that told him he wanted something more than just confirmation from Billy of a genuine apology.

It had nearly ended in Steve getting his face bashed in against his own car. His words always came out a little mixed up, he’d learned, ever since he’d decided he wanted to do better, and he couldn’t entirely blame Billy for taking it wrong when Steve walked up between their cars (since he’d deliberately parked next to Billy’s Camaro that morning), and started off with, “If your apology to those kids was some kinda prank, I swear I will make you regret it.” Billy’d gotten even closer to Steve, wild smirk on his face and fire sparking in his eyes as his mouth snarled open to say something Steve never got to hear.

He tried to blame weeks of not getting laid and being best friends with a fourteen year old kid lately for the way his body reacted, but being surrounded by the scent and warmth of Billy’s body, one of Billy’s legs right up between his, got him so hard so fast he nearly saw stars. And of fucking course Billy felt it. There was a moment of panic, where Steve thought he was going to actually die, gay-bashed by a high school bully after surviving literal monsters.

Instead, Billy had leaned in and kissed him. Made him practically melt against his car, a heat inconsistent with the biting January day suffusing his body.

After that, the fucking becomes a surprisingly regular thing. Unexpected, but not entirely unwelcome.

o0o

“Fuck, I miss sunshine,” Billy says, sprawled out again on the hood of his Camaro, beer in one hand while the other traces lazy, maddening patterns up and down Steve’s thigh. “Digging my feet into blistering sand, watching the waves and the women. Hawkins is a fucking shithole.”

Steve can’t really disagree. Clouds fill the night sky, blocking out the stars, with only a slightly brighter patch of cloud to mark the progress of the moon through the sky. The whole week has been gray and dreary, alternating miserable freezing rain and snowflakes that turned to ice as soon as they hit the ground. Even Billy, always full of wild, blinding energy, had stuck to the speed limit while driving to their favorite place that day.

“Cali never really goes below sixty,” Billy says. He takes a drag on his cigarette, blowing smoke into the air overhead to mingle with the smoke of their breath in the frigid air. “Christ, what I wouldn’t give to be on the beach in sixty degree weather, laughing at the girls huddling together in their puffy coats.”

“Sounds nice,” Steve says, and he means it.

o0o

The talking worries Steve sometimes, in a place deep under his ribs that he tried to lock away after Nancy broke his heart. Longing coats Billy’s voice so thick that Steve can taste it, and he is afraid.

o0o

“After graduation, I’m gonna go back to Cali,” Billy tells Steve, the first time he lets Steve tangle them together after sex, head resting on Billy’s warm chest while one of Billy’s arms curls around his waist.

Steve almost hates him for breaking the silence.

Thoughts of his own black hole of a future working for his dad’s company and never leaving Hawkins swirl across his mind, and he’s so jealous he can’t breathe.

Still, he’s never been great at talking about his feelings, so all he says is, “Yeah, going to Cali sounds nice. Getting out of Hawkins sounds nice, too.” And when Billy smiles at him, low and _soft_ in the darkness, Steve can’t breathe for an entirely different reason.

o0o

“The ocean’s beautiful in sunlight, but it fuckin’ sparkles under the moon. Even at night, the waves are warm, green like envy but there’s fuckin’ nothing to be jealous of when you’re on the beach in Cali, sand between your bare toes and pretty girls and pretty boys everywhere you look.”

The wistful lilt to his voice makes Steve’s ribcage feel too small.

“Gotta watch out for the current though. The waves are wild things, and the undertow’ll drag you down in a heartbeat if you’re not careful.”

Steve looks at the curl of Billy’s mouth, moonlight glinting off a few exposed teeth, and he thinks he understands wild things and being dragged underwater.

o0o

They’re at Steve’s house when he breaks. Billy’s talking about California again, couldn’t even wait till after the sex, starts talking as soon as he’s in Steve’s house with his boots by the door, and Steve can’t handle it anymore. He’s going to lose Billy sooner or later, so why not tear the bandaid off right now?

“What are we even doing?”

The question cuts Billy off mid-sentence, and he stares at Steve, a little furrow in his brow.

“What do you mean?” His guard has gone back up, head tilted to eye Steve sidelong, ready to shoot right out the door, and isn’t that typical Billy always ready to run.

“I mean this!” Steve says, words coming out louder than he intended as he gestures between them. “Us! What we’ve been doing, hooking up in the shadows while you talk about fucking California all the time!”

Billy’s expression has turned hard. There’s a sneer on his lips when he asks, “Why don’t you tell me what you think we’ve been doing?”

And Steve doesn’t know what to say to that, so he rakes an angry hand through his hair as says as much. “I don’t know.”

Hurt flashes through Billy’s eyes at that, but there’s rage there too, the rage he always uses to cover up his pain, and why shouldn’t he feel pain when all he can talk about lately is leaving?

“You know what?” he says, after a few false starts and grinding teeth. “ _I_ thought we were doing something, but I guess not. So fuck you too, Harrington. Guess I’ll see you at school.”

Steve’s too surprised to stop him as he drags his boots back onto his feet and all but bolts, slamming the door behind himself. Ringing silence lingers for minutes after, loud in Steve’s ears.

o0o

The next week is utterly miserable.

March fades into April, bringing wildflowers and a riot of green to the woods around Hawkins, but Steve drags rainclouds behind him wherever he goes. Even Nancy notices, cornering him to ask after his mental state, and he can’t bring himself to tell the truth. That he dumped the guy who made him feel happy again, the one person in this miserable town who wanted him more than they wanted anyone else they could have.

Not more than he wanted a state full of sand and sunshine far away from tiny little Hawkins, Indiana, but how could Steve ever hope to compete with something like that?

He brushes Nancy off with painted smiles and false charm, and she leaves him with another half dozen worried looks before Jonathan swoops in to capture her attention.

And Steve thinks, Billy’s going to leave sooner or later, and maybe he’d be pretty fucking stupid not to hold on to every possible second before later rolls around.

He leaves a note in Billy’s locker at the end of the day, pointedly doesn’t wait around for Billy to find it.

o0o

Rough bark digs into Steve’s back as he waits at their spot in the woods. If Billy doesn’t show, he’s going to feel really fucking stupid, and a little more heartbroken than he already is on top of it. It rained in the evening, and his sneakers squelch in mud as he shifts from foot to foot in the chill northern breeze.

The roar of Billy’s Camaro loosens something inside Steve, and he can breathe for the first time all week.

Billy is quiet and guarded when he gets out of his car. There’s a smirk on his lips, sure, but it’s brittle, fragile at the edges in a way Billy usually isn’t unless he’s talking about his dad. A knife twists in Steve’s sternum at the thought that he put that look on Billy’s face.

“I’m sorry,” he says, carefully planned apology falling to pieces in the face of that look. Billy’s lips twist down, and Steve trips over his words to in his haste to get something out. “I’m sorry,” he says again, “Fuck, I’m sorry, I was mad, okay, and scared, but I didn’t mean it.” His eyes blur, and he looks down at the mud and the green growing ground, swipes angrily at the wetness on his cheeks. “I don’t want to lose you.”

When he looks up, Billy is closer, one big rough hand reaching out an inch from Steve’s face. Steve turns his head, closing his eyes against more tears and breathing in the scent of cigarettes and Billy’s cheap cologne. Billy cups his cheek, callused fingers sliding over smooth skin to pull Steve’s face to his shoulder, his other arm coming up around Steve’s waist to pull the rest of him closer too.

“And here I thought I was the one who acted like an asshole when I get mad,” Billy says. Steve hears the tremor of a laugh in Billy’s chest, but there’s a catch in his voice Steve recognizes for something less lighthearted. He feels the same sandpaper rawness in his own throat, and bites back the urge to beg Billy not to leave.

Steve Harrington is a lot of things. He’s a great babysitter, the previous king of Hawkins High, and surprisingly good at fighting off otherworldly monsters with nothing more than a baseball bat full of nails. He’s great at bullshit, too, being bullshit and spouting bullshit. What he isn’t is worth asking anyone to give up their dreams just for him, and as oblivious as he is, he can recognize the longing in Billy’s voice when he talks about California.

So he bites his tongue and sinks into Billy’s embrace, sinks into Billy later that night in the backseat of Billy’s car, and pretends that how much Billy wants him now is enough.

“You _are_ and asshole when you get mad,” he says later, with his head over Billy’s heart and Billy’s fingers in his hair. He smiles and nuzzles at the fuzzy hair on Billy’s chest to take the sting out of the words, and feels the laugh rumble under his cheek, even as the fingers still in his hair.

“Yeah, well, I’m sorry too.”

Billy isn’t looking at Steve when he glances up, which is how Steve knows he’s being serious.

“Sorry about all the shit I pulled before, well. Before this,” Billy continues, whispered like he’s sharing a secret with the off-white roof of the Camaro. “I get mad a lot. But I don’t want to. I’m trying not to. I don’t want to be like him.” He doesn’t need to specify who.

“You don’t have to be,” Steve says. And then, before his mouth can betray him and say something stupid like, “I love you, please don’t leave me,” he kisses Billy, drowns the words in Billy’s mouth deep and slow and hard like California waves. From the way Billy kisses back, he wonders, in a small selfish place in the back of his mind, if Billy got the message anyway.

o0o

May comes in, as they say, like a lamb, full of sunshine that can’t compare to Cali skies and green trees that are nothing like the palm trees Billy gets practically poetic over, and Billy gets suspended two weeks before graduation. The rumor mill spreads fast, but Steve was close enough in the hall to hear how the fight actually started.

Tommy is being his usual asshole self, and Steve misses the first half of the conversation, but he’s walking by, glancing at Billy’s gorgeous body out the corner of his eye, when Tommy says, “That sister of yours is looking awful pretty ever since puberty finally hit her. Is it hard sharing a house with her now that she’s got tits, or does it mean you get first dibs?” And Billy snaps.

Tommy misses a whole day of school while his face heals. Billy misses three for the suspension.

When he comes back, he drags Steve into playing hooky during last period English so they can go out to their spot in the woods. There’s new bruises on his face that Tommy didn’t put there, and he grips a cigarette between shaking fingers.

“I’m leaving,” he says, “soon as graduation’s over.” And Steve thinks _Oh_ before the pain fully hits.

He swallows around the lump in his throat, around the _You could stay with me_ that would only put Billy’s back up at imagined pity, and says, “Yeah? Sounds reasonable,” instead. Billy smiles at him wide open and honest, and his heart fractures for the second time in his life.

There’s that bullshit, again.

o0o

Panting breaths fog the windows of the Camaro under thin strips of cloud and moonlight as Steve tightens his legs around Billy’s waist, draws in him closer, harder, and muffles his cries with his teeth in Billy’s shoulder. Billy’s elbows bracket his face, their sweat and breath mingling in the close interior of the backseat of the car, and Steve thinks _maybe_ , maybe if he tangles them up enough, Billy won’t be able to leave without him.

o0o

No matter how hard he holds on with greedy grasping fingers, time keeps slipping away like smoke on the breeze.

o0o

Steve’s parents come to graduation, which surprises him. They always have a dozen different business trips in the spring, but they arrive fresh from the airport just to see him walk across the stage, don’t even leave till they’ve congratulated him after.

Billy doesn’t show up, which surprises Steve less. He was banned from walking after the suspension, and even though a part of Steve thinks, _He didn’t even say goodbye,_ the rest of him remembers the bruises that were never from fights at school and thinks, _I hope he makes it to California okay._

The drive home is quiet; after his parents left to head back to the airport and business trips, he brushed off all the graduation parties, just wanted to escape back to his empty house for his last few nights of childhood before his empty future starts.

Except –

There’s a familiar blue Camaro parked in his driveway, a familiar figure leaning against the driver’s side door with a cigarette held loosely between his upturned lips.

Billy smirks around the cigarette, pulls it from his mouth with dexterous fingers when Steve pulls in next to him, and says, “Christ that took forever, Harrington. Get your stuff and let’s get out of here.”

He must see the confusion in Steve’s face. Hunches his shoulders up around his ears while one finger taps a nervous rhythm on the cigarette. “Unless you’re not coming with me. Just, you said it sounded nice, so I figured,” and he trails off, but Steve is beaming.

There’s hope and joy and love bubbling up in Steve’s chest too much to contain, so he doesn’t, kisses Billy instead and says, “Yeah, of course I’m coming with you.” And Steve has never seen the sun set in California over the Pacific Ocean, but he thinks it can’t possibly hold a candle to the sunshine in Billy’s smile.

**Author's Note:**

> And then they lived happily ever after, because this is fanfic and I can do what I want!
> 
> Also, yes, I did turn my silly little Harringrove imagine from tumblr into a proper fic. If this idea seems familiar, that would be why.


End file.
